From the Author’s Note: The stories in this volume record happenings in men’s lives which interested me during years of wandering among the bushmen and natives of Cape York Pensinsula; the pearlers, trochus and beche-de-mer getters of the Coral Sea; the native islanders of Torres Strait; the beach-combers of the Great Barrier Reef…with two exceptions all are transcripts of fact or are largely based on fact…I hope Colonel Woodman, Bert Vigden of Thursday Island, Bert Jardine of Somerset and others will not mind their names being mentioned. My old mate Dick Welch, I know, will not; neither will “Scandalous” Graham. “Scandalous” may swear a lot and say harsh things about me, then quietly show the book in almost every shearing shed in New South Wales and Queensland, That is, if he’s “out of trouble.”  It doesn’t get any better than that!